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Volunteerism

Central Ohioan finds a calling helping Sandy victims

How to help

Guyon Rescue: The group is now working on gutting homes, eradicating mold and rebuilding. The organization is seeking air purifiers and dehumidifiers. More information on Guyon Rescue can be found at www.guyonrescue.org or on the organization’s Facebook page.

American Red Cross: The organization is still taking donations to help with superstorm Sandy relief. Information can be found at www.redcross.org.

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View SlideshowRequest to buy this photoKyle Robertson | DISPATCHEverett “Bud” Gasbarro packed up this van shortly after superstorm Sandy hit on Oct. 29 and lived in it for nine weeks while helping with cleanup efforts in Staten Island, N.Y. He plans to head back.

MOUNT VERNON, Ohio — Everett “Bud” Gasbarro, slumped in his chair and sobbing into a dish towel,
apologized over and over.

“I shouldn’t have left them. I shouldn’t have,” he said, shaking his head. “I really feel so
terrible. I don’t know what to do.”

Gasbarro is doubled over, quite literally, by guilt because he left Staten Island, N.Y., where
he has spent the past nine weeks living in his van and volunteering in the superstorm Sandy
recovery effort.

He returned on Sunday to his home in Knox County, intending to load up some additional tools and
head right back. But a bad cough slowed him. He hopes, maybe, to head out early next week.

An emotional guy on an ordinary day, Gasbarro now can barely speak about his time in New York
without crying. But those who worked alongside him have plenty to say.

“In my mind, Buddy was the heart and soul of the operation up there,” said John Meekins, a
former newspaperman from Worthington. Meekins volunteered for 10 days in Staten Island in December
and met Gasbarro there after people kept telling him he should find “that other man from Ohio” who
was so friendly.

“He was so positive, so upbeat, that I know he made a difference to countless people,” Meekins
said.

Sandy roared ashore on Oct. 29, leaving behind tens of billions of dollars in property damage,
most of it in New York and New Jersey, and killing more than 130 people.

After watching news reports of the devastation in November, Gasbarro Googled “volunteer efforts”
in New York, and a mission called Guyon Rescue popped up first on the list.

“So I looked up the directions and hit
print,” he said. He loaded some tools — a broom, a shovel, a rake and a few power saws —
into his van and headed east.

Founded a few days after the storm, Guyon has served more than 10,000 hot meals to local
residents and operates a store where families needing help can get just about anything. The core
volunteers are mostly Staten Island born and raised, Karen Torrone, a co-founder, said.

“So to have some guy from Ohio show up in his van and become one of us and help all this time
was a beautiful sight,” she said. Gasbarro worries about what might happen to him if he doesn’t
return. The 55-year-old former chef and truck driver had taken care of his mother for six years
before she died in February 2011. He has been devastated since then.

But working with Guyon has rejuvenated his spirit and renewed his soul.

At first, he was afraid his two bad knees and a bum back would hinder him. But from making
coffee to sweeping the floors to chatting with the families who come in, he has found his
gifts.

That’s the real lesson in his story, he said. “Those people in Staten Island, they’ve given me
my life back. Volunteering is like the fountain of youth. Anyone can find some way to help.”